


Intentions

by biswholocked



Series: JWP 2015 [9]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Bleeding Out, Community: watsons_woes, Could be read as an AU or Series 4 speculation, Gunshot Wounds, Multi, Triage, Unspecified Setting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-09
Updated: 2015-07-09
Packaged: 2018-04-08 12:29:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4305138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/biswholocked/pseuds/biswholocked
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Love is an act of will -- namely, both an intention and an action. Will also implies choice. We do not have to love. We choose to love.” </p><p>"John," Mary whispers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Intentions

**Author's Note:**

> Written for day nine of JWP. The prompt was: "Healer's Choice. One person Watson chose not to save." I didn't really consider where this belongs in the show's timeline until after it was written, so it can be read as either a series three AU or series four speculation.

“John,” Mary whispers. John grits his teeth and ignores her, presses down harder on the wound in her chest that’s spilling blood onto his hands and over the black of her shirt, turning it shiny.

Mary’s fingers curl around his wrist and weakly squeeze until he looks up and meets her eyes. They’re glassy and slightly unfocused as tears spill down her cheeks.

“John,” she repeats. “Go.”

John shakes his head. “No. _No_. I can do this, I can save both of you--”

She smiles, but it’s wobbly. “You know you can’t.”

John can hear Sherlock’s rattling breath to his right; Mary’s chest struggles to rise under him. He pictures the two bullets that are sitting in Sherlock’s body, one to the leg, one to the stomach, and the one in Mary, that ripped through her arteries and is next to her heart, corrupting its beat. (And he knows, deep down, what the choice is. Save one, lose the other. Unthinkable. Unavoidable.)

“Mary,” he starts, and can’t finish. The tips of his fingers, digging into her wound, have gone numb.

“I know,” she encourages, and after another moment John disengages himself and turns his attention to Sherlock; life rushes out of Mary in his wake. A minute later, as he’s curbing Sherlock’s blood loss, his ears are filled with the sound of Mary coughing up blood. (Sherlock stares at him throughout. John can feel it on him, heavy, but keeps his gaze averted and works in silence.)

By the time the ambulance arrives, she’s gone.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments/ con crit always welcome! I'm curious as to what people think of this one.


End file.
